The Bookman - Lavie Tidhar [8]
"Not for me!" Marx said quickly. "For a friend of mine." He straightened up. "Good work, my young friend. Can I trust you to…"
"I'll deliver them to the Red Lion myself," Orphan said.
Marx smiled. "How is your poetry coming along?" He didn't wait for a reply. "I think Jack is waiting for me. I'll, um, show myself in. And remember – mum's the word."
Orphan put his finger to his lips. Marx nodded, ran his fingers through his beard again, and disappeared through the small door that led down to the basement.
"For a friend of mine," Orphan said aloud, and laughed. Then he took a healthy swig of his coffee and bent back down to the newspaper which was, of course, full of last night's events at the Rose.
"IRVING FINALLY LOSES HEAD!" screamed the headline. "SHOW ENDS WITH A BANG!" The name of the writer, an R. Kipling, was familiar to him: they were of about the same age, and had come across one another several times in town, though they had not formed a friendship. Kipling was a staunch Caliban supporter, as was evident from his reporting of the explosion:
"Late last night (wrote Kipling), a bomb went off at the controversial production of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, killing the show's star and artistic director, Mr. Henry Irving, and wounding several others. Police have closed off the area and investigation has been undertaken by Scotland Yard's new and formidable inspector, Irene Adler. Eyewitness testimony suggests Irving was killed by a booby-trapped copy of the book of the play that was delivered to him on stage by the young actor Beerbohm Tree, playing the Ancient Mariner to Irving's Shakespeare. The play raised much antipathy in official circles and was justly avoided by all law-abiding citizens and faithful servants of Les Lézards. It was, however, popular with a certain type of revolutionary rabble, and sadly tolerated under our Queen's benign rule and her commitment to our nation's principles of the freedom of speech."
Orphan sighed and rubbed his eyes; he needed a shave. He took another sip of (by now cooling) coffee and continued reading, though his mind wasn't in it: his head was awhirl with images of Lucy, and he kept returning to the night before, to the words they spoke to each other, to their kiss like a seal of the future… He sighed and scratched the beginning of a beard and decided he'd take the afternoon off to go see her. Let Jack do some work, for a change: he, Orphan, had better things to do on this day.
"Though there is official silence regarding the investigation (Kipling continued) this reporter has managed to make a startling discovery. It has come to my attention that, though Irving's co-star, the young Beerbohm, was apparently killed in the explosion alongside his master, a man corresponding exactly to Beerbohm's description was taken in for questioning earlier today! If Beerbohm is still alive, who was the man delivering the book on stage? If, indeed, it was a man at all…"
The doorbell rang again, and Orphan lifted his head at the new set of approaching footsteps. He knew who it would be before looking. At that time of day, in this shop, no casual browser was likely to come in. Only members of what Orphan, only half-jokingly, had come to call the Parliament of Payne.
"Greetings, young Orphan!" said a booming voice, and a hand reached out and plucked a well-worn penny from behind Orphan's ear. Orphan grinned up at John Maskelyne. "Hello, Nevil."
Maskelyne frowned and scratched his bushy moustache. "No one," he said, "dares use my second name, you lout." He threw the coin in the air, where it disappeared. "Jack in?"
Orphan mutely nodded towards the basement door.
"Good, good," Maskelyne said, but he seemed in no hurry to depart. He began wandering around the shop, pulling books at random from the shelves, humming to himself. "Have you heard about Beerbohm?" his disembodied voice